Platform focused on exposing up-and-coming artists and creatives associated with Las Vegas
Here, I documented our little trip in California. Initially, we came for the Beach Goth music festival but after a storm came through and flooded the venue, my friends and I made fun elsewhere. Check out our adventure through the musical fun and the spontaneous activities!
Meet Gabe Allred and Holly Rae Vaughn, the creative masterminds behind Battle Born Pins. What started as an obsession for Gabe, turned into an overnight success for the couple. After releasing their unicorn pin, inspired by Blade Runner, the duo was shortly discovered by Vice’s, The Creators Project. Get to know more about how they started, their creative process, and more in our Light Leaks interview.
Nica Moten (aka Fashionnica) has been spotted doing everything from modeling clothes for local brands (like Crykit’s Playhouse and KYNEW), hosting RAW Femme’s first inaugural artist showcase and empowering women with her new business, HER Collection. She is a model, freelance fashion stylist, and an online shop boutique owner. To top it all off, Fashionnica is proud to be launching her self-named clothing line in November.
Meeting Nica for the first time, her warm, bubbly, and enthusiastic personality is refreshing and up-lifting. During our interview, she described herself as someone who loves her city and is someone who wants to contribute to the growth that Las Vegas has been experiencing. “Vegas has been unique all along. We are slowly changing the way our culture looks at our city. Not for the sin, but for the beautiful structure and substance we have from all the amazing artists this city harbors,” Nica said.
Although born in San Diego, Nica moved to Las Vegas at a young age and has always appreciated the diversity of cultures she grew up around. “In high school, every ethnic culture was at my school…since it’s a transit town, everyone is in and out but while people are here they bring their values, cultures, and art from their hometowns. It’s a beautiful thing,” Nica said.
Always growing her repertoire of talents, Nica received her cosmetology license from Euphoria, attended Fashion Careers International in Los Angeles for merchandise marketing where she also received her fashion buyers license. Sometime in mid-November, she will be presenting her own clothing line, Fashionnica. Highly inspired by the 90s and elements in nature, the Fashionnica line will have a mix of basic pieces and edgy pieces.
Nica was gracious enough to collaborate on an interview and styling video with me to showcase her talents. Watch our interview to learn more about the boss babe and check out how she styles summer pieces into Fall appropriate outfits.
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Here’s a little photo diary from the week of Life is Shit and Life is Beautiful:
Big thanks to Bad Moon Booking and Life is Shit for putting together a night that locals could throughly enjoy. If you’re up for seeing more great local shows here’s what Bad Moon Booking has coming up:
For more, check out this interview with the Director of Life is Shit and founder of Bad Moon Booking, Tsvetelina Stefanova: http://wp.me/p6r9vr-m7
Zet Gold’s art is playful, childlike, and occasionally backed by clever puns. She calls the process of creating art “birdwatching” which expresses stories made from daily observations.
Born in Saudi Arabia, Gold grew up praying in underground churches with styrofoam windows. Her father moved from the Philippines to Saudi Arabia for work, where he was also a missionary pastor. Concealing her Christian faith in a Muslim country gave Gold an interesting perspective to view the world from. After burying their Bibles in the ground, Gold and her family left Saudi Arabia for San Diego, then eventually to Las Vegas.
Gold recently graduated from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas with a BFA in graphic design and has exhibited countless art shows. The Bakery, is where you can find her creating most of her work—she shares the studio with her brother, Miah (fashion designer), and Jasmin (fashion photographer). She credits street graffiti as her doorway into the art world. “It kinda started off just hitting up trains with my brother, then a year after I started to take art more serious,” Gold said.
Besides “birdwatching” Gold has collaborated with various local artists, musicians and businesses—Flora Pop, Echo Stains and Chase R. McCurdy to name a few. Her next show will be a The Bakery on November 12th with musician, Sonia.
Tsvetelina Stefanova (Tsvet, for short) has a heap of titles under her belt and is impressive, to say the least. First, she’s a badass musician and has played with a slew of bands. Same Sex Mary is her main project which she started six years ago with her boyfriend, James Howard Adams. Furthermore, she is the entertainment director at The Dillinger, the sponsorship manager for the Dam Short Film Festival in Boulder City, the director for the Life is Shit Music Festival and the founder of Bad Moon Booking.
Most major cities have thriving music scenes ingrained in their culture, but Las Vegas has been out-of-the-loop since the days of the Rat Pack and Sinatra. Five or six years ago, you couldn’t find many local or independent bands playing in Las Vegas—let alone playing for free. Maybe you could catch a few bands at The Huntridge Theatre or The Sanctuary, but those days are long gone.
As of recent, Las Vegas has cultivated solid musical talent and venues, like The Griffin and The Bunkhouse. For the past year and a half, Bad Moon Booking has organized free shows with a ton of amazing local and touring bands. From years of touring, Tsvet made countless connections throughout the South Western states and found herself frequently setting up bands with gigs in Las Vegas. Booking acts became a passion for her which led to the birth of Bad Moon Booking. This October, Bad Moon Booking is showcasing an exciting mini-series at the Plaza Casino & Hotel’s outdoor venue—equipped with a beer garden. The shows are during the first, four Saturdays of October. So be sure to mark your calendars.
Life is Shit Music Festival is another project Tsvet became a part of during the fest’s second year. Founder Jack Johnson created Life is Shit as a direct counter-music festival to contrast with the mainstream, Life is Beautiful Music Festival. According to Johnson, Life is Beautiful “displac[ed] another local-run festival and rubb[ed] a lot of people the wrong way.” To repair that loss, the one-day fest was created for the Las Vegas locals to enjoy for free during Life is Beautiful. “I just wanted Life is Shit to be something inclusive and organically created by locals, for locals…Life is Shit has become a product of not just a few people and a cool bar with a ridiculous festival name, but a community,” Johnson said. The fest consists of local bands with a few astounding established touring acts on the bill.
During our interview, Tsvet talks about what to expect at the festival hosted at The Dive Bar on September 23rd.
A social butterfly. A beauty queen. Daniyell Brianne (aka Daniyell the Unicorn) never claims to be a profession model yet she has won two InstaGrammys because of the stunning photos she regularly posts. This year she is up for Snapchat’s influencer award that will be hosted at Intrigue Night Club on September 29th.
Daniyell is a native to Las Vegas and was given her nickname due to her obsession with unicorns. She currently works as a hair stylist at Las Vegas’ first DryBar salon. Last week, I had the pleasure of shooting with her and got to know the badass social media queen a little better. Also big thanks to Tasha Montano for doing the amazing makeup for the shoot.
Check out our photo shoot! (click to enlarge)
After our trip to Oahu, my mom, boyfriend and I jumped on a plane to Maui. Since we only had one full day to enjoy the island we were lucky enough to get advice from the locals on what to do. So we chose to do Hana Highway which takes you around the prime spots on the island. The best part is that you can do a self-guided tour and chose to stop off anywhere you want. I only wish I had more time to explore Maui. I guess there’s always next time.
Watch us get crushed by some massive waves! LOL.
During my family trip to Hawaii, I wanted to test out how well the iPhone 6s captured video as well as put together a memento we could all look back at. So here are the highlights of our trip mashed up into a small video. Overall, I think the quality of the video from the iPhone was better than I anticipated. Let me know what you guys think.
I spent about a week getting reacquainted with the dynamics of my family. It had been years (so many that I can’t even remember how many) since we’d been on a family trip together. The travelers were my boyfriend (Ian) my older sister (Momo), her husband (Alex), their kids (Aria and Jayden), and my mom.
The journey was documented through film photographs and video that will be up in a separate post.
Check out some 35mm photos from our fun exploration:
Light Leaks 